Stealing the 2004 election (continued).

State police officers have gone into the homes of elderly black voters in Orlando and interrogated them as part of an odd "investigation" that has frightened many voters, intimidated elderly volunteers and thrown a chill over efforts to get out the black vote in November.

The officers, from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which reports to Gov. Jeb Bush, say they are investigating allegations of voter fraud that came up during the Orlando mayoral election in March.

Officials refused to discuss details of the investigation, other than to say that absentee ballots are involved. They said they had no idea when the investigation might end, and acknowledged that it may continue right through the presidential election.

We're sure it's just a coincidence, but a lot of those questioned by Florida investigators were involved in successful efforts to increase black voting in Orlando. Bob Herbert's conversation with a Department of Law Enforcement spokesperson Geo Morales is especially telling when considered in this light:

I asked Mr. Morales in a telephone conversation to tell me what criminal activity had taken place.

"I can't talk about that," he said.

I asked if all the people interrogated were black.

"Well, mainly it was a black neighborhood we were looking at - yes,'' he said.

He also said, "Most of them were elderly."

When I asked why, he said, "That's just the people we selected out of a random sample to interview."

This magpie thinks we can chalk this one up as more evidence of the degree to which Dubya and the Republicans are starting to run scared.

Random samples don't work that way. A random sample would not wind up with mostly black and mostly elderly participants. The language used by the police is a dead giveaway that they are hiding things, and I wonder what that could be.